Wednesday, May 27, 2009

I mentioned, a little over a month ago, that my beloved truck died. The first truck my father bought brand new (in 1993.) and swore he would never part with. The truck that took me on innumerable adventures and excursions, that my father gave to me when I was car less and single trying to get Monkey to daycare and my rear to school and to work. I felt like I won a battle when he signed the title over to me. The Cowboy just replaced the engine a year ago. That truck was my trophy. It wasn't great, but that didn't matter. It was my Toyo, my little-red-girl-truck. Now it rests under a tree in the yard, next to two other broken down trucks awaiting The Cowboys surgical genius.

(Sooo Redneck! We have three... errr four broken down vehicles lining the driveway. "Welcome to The Swamp Ranch - Horses, Bugs, "farm" mud, and now offering Used Trucks".)

When the truck died we started scouring Craigslist for a cheap car, since we can't alter our credit until we get a house. We looked at a mexi-gangsta-fied Turcel ("All my friends know tha low-rider...") A white Mazda at a bonafied chop-shop (call this number on the door... it's a digital voice asking me to leave a message.) And ultimately found a Purple Mazda 626 in Colton for $1000.

We test drove the Little Purple Monster, and it appeared to be in fine working condition. Something that would get me to work and around town until we move and can finance a new, more suitable vehicle.

(read. Ford Expedition. Diesel.)

We lay down the cash, sign the bill of sale, take the keys and head home. Not twenty miles up the highway, the "check engine" light comes on.

(Lovely.)

We concluded that lots of cars "check engine" lights are on, and well, what's done is done. So the next day I drive the Little Purple Monster to work, the brakes start screaming at me on my way home. OK, brakes. Sure, no problem, I can do brakes.

Day four with the little purple shit, the "Hold" light starts winking at me on the way to deposit Monkey at school. I look up what that might mean (I love google.) and learn that the transmission needs to be serviced.

(Sigh.)

I register the Little Purple Bastard, get the oil changed and have the transmission serviced. The Cowboy changes the breaks AND routers, which have a lovely 1/8 inch lip on them.

Week two:Squealing. High pitched, embarrassing, torturous squealing. All the way down the 6 mile stretch of highway to Monkey's bus stop. Good thing I was early enough for the bus that day.High pitched, embarrassing, torturous squealing. All the way back home. Took the day off work. My boss is a very understanding man, in case I haven't mentioned this before.

No car = No workNo Work and No Kids = SleepSleep = Peace

The Cowboy came home, bought a water pump and the next weekend spent an ENTIRE day putting it in. A Water pump. A DAMN water pump, required dismantling the better half of the engine and removing most of what was under the hood. And the passenger wheel.

(This is ultimately what is required to fix my Toyo. Pull out the engine and send it back to be repaired or replaced.)

Water Pump in, car happy.Yeah? Um-No.

Week four:Engine light has not come back on. Shifting is still quirky, but I'm letting off the gas and not forcing it through. I'm learning if I baby The Monster, it will take me where I need to go. It's not making funny or horrendous noises, it's not smoking or screeching, the blue smoke is mostly gone in the morning... we're learning to like each other.

Then for no apparent reason, the bastard died when I was half way to work on Friday. No sputtering, No stall out, No knocking or sign of protest. It just died while I was at a stop light waiting to turn right, and refused defibulation. I tried, I begged, I didnt pound on the steering wheel, I talked really nicely to it, to no avail.

Fortunately The Cowboy works four 10's, so Friday is his day to sleep in and sit in front of the computer. So I called him. He wasn't surprised. He didn't even seem upset this time. He just rolled out of bed and came to my rescue.

We chained the LPM to The Beast, his borderline obnoxiously huge truck (Which is the only material reason that I fell in love with him.) (He knows this. it's all good.) and towed it home.

(When I say the only material reason I mean; when we started dating I told him I didn't really like him I just loved his truck. It's become a running joke with us. He knows I really love him for the way his butt looks in Wranglers.)

Fortunately the car died on a Friday, so I didn't have to miss another day of work. Unfortunately that Friday landed on Memorial Day weekend. So our plans to go riding at the beach were nixed for the exciting world of car parts.

We decided not to fix the PM when it became apparent that the car itself doesn't know what is wrong. One minute it thinks its the oxygen sensor, the next it's the fuel pump (or something stupid like that.) So, just as I was preparing to call my sister and ask to borrow their nightmare spare car, The Cowboy got a text from his friend. It seems this friend acquired another horse and has decided that he needs to go buy another truck, so he is selling the Saturn he just picked up. We were welcome to buy it for the $1500 he had put into it, if we wanted. He said he wouldn't sell it to us if he didn't have absolute faith in it, since he knows the luck we've had with cars over the past 2 years.So we went out to Greshlahem, and test drove the ... I haven't thought of a nickname for it yet. It's clean, it doesn't stutter or smoke or scream. The engine light didn't come on when I drove it home, and it seems to like me.

I tell ya, for as bummed as I was that The Cowboy was working 60 hour weeks in February and March, I am sooooo grateful now. We set that overtime aside so we'd have money for escrow when the time came, and we have since spent over half of it on 2 cars and car parts in the past month.

As I thanked the friend I told him if the car dies on me in the next month I will have to kick him out of the wedding.

Friday, May 15, 2009

I love dill pickles. Sometimes sliced into quarter size rounds, placed on top of an equally sized square of Tillimook cheddar cheese. Other times, straight out of the jar. I used to drink pickle juice until my sister told me it was vinegar.

I cant stand sweet pickles.

When I was 18 my hair was purple for a couple months, then blonde... bad bad blonde. When I was 16 it was black, and red... most of the time.

I have very plain, annoyingly fine, uncurlable brown hair. With highlights, of course.

Why does spell check want to take the "e" off the end of "blonde"?

I got my first tattoo when I was 16. My mother discovered it just hours after arriving at our hotel in Disney World, the beginning of a 2 week adventure. All she said was, "That better not be real." It was never mentioned again. You already know this because I am alive to tell you about it.

I love egg salad, but only when it's made with Miracle Whip. I think part of the reason I love it so much is that my sister hates the smell. When we were growing up we went skiing alot; I would always take egg salad sandwiches, which would stink up the entire cab of the truck, annoying the crap out of my sister, often resulting in her sitting outside in the snow to eat her lunch. With her outside, I could stretch out and take over the entire backseat. Thus my love for, and her loathing of, egg salad was born.

Yesterday I ran two miles in 19.9 minutes. But if I'd have tried to run a third I would have collapsed. If I slow down I will be walking, so perhaps I need to just keep running like I did yesterday and someday I will get to three, or thirty minutes... then six and an hour... then...

Tuesday night I drank an entire fifth of Citrus Skyy and didn't realize it until I went to make another drink and the bottle was empty.I was not hungover on Wednesday.This is a little concerning to me, but not enough to do anything about it at this juncture.

If someone had told me, ten years ago, that my life would be the way it is I would have told them they were full of it; then, armed with that information, I probably would have gone on the adventure that everyone thought I went on after High School. I stayed in town for a boy whom I allowed to crush all of my aspirations. Then I left him and started on another adventure, in the same city.I am really glad no one told me.

I hated beer and wine until I was 24. Now to go beer or wine tasting, is one of my favorite things. I have learned to appreciate the color, aroma, taste, texture, and various complexities of beers and wines. While I am far from a connoisseur, I am definitely an aficionado.

My favorite beer is Drop Top. If you've never experienced it's milky amber goodness, I strongly suggest you add it to your list of things to try before you die.

I loved writing, most of my life. That is until I took my college English class. I never put much thought into being grammatically correct, I just wrote and things always seemed to turn out alright. Then my college English professor got all anal about grammar and proper punctuation and now I can not seem to write a proper sentence.

It's a random road trip weekend! First, pick North-South or East-West. Second, flip a coin; Heads = North (or east), Tails = South (or west). Third, grab a camera, toothbrush, and a jacket with a hood (just in case). Fuel up the truck and drive in the direction the coin stated. There is no specified mile marker to the next coin toss. There is no destination or expectation. Just adventure. See what's down that road you never turned down before.

Tuesday, May 12, 2009

Congratulations on your acquisition of WAMU! I'm sure you are very excited about the new surge of business coming your way.Personally, I think it's sad that so many people are now being forced to deal with your incompetence and complete disregard for your customers. I, for one, completely understand. I'm sure acquiring all of those struggling mortgages was a brilliant idea, given the kickbacks Uncle Sam is going to give you when they all finally go into foreclosure. But really, you should be just a little bit willing to actually try sell the houses while they are in short-sale. If not for the fact that foreclosure can destroy a family's credit, think about the families out there that have been responsible and are able to buy in these times. If you dont want to sell anything, just say so. But losing paperwork, twice, and then taking the maximum 14 days, EACH TIME, to look at a damn fax, is just a little ridiculous.I am not trying to steal a property from you. I would like to purchase it at a fair market value; which is completely insane on my part anyway, but that's beside the point. I have financing available. All I need your "customer service agent" to do is to say, "Yes, we will accept this price." or "No, a person's life earnings, is not quite enough for this particular plot of land and moderate house." That's all you really have to do. Yes, or No. If you say, "No." I can hopefully get an offer in on another property that is not in short sale, and which I love far more than the one you own, before my pre-approval expires and I have to start this entire process over again. The problem is the Cowboy, the wonderful loving man that he is, wants the house that you own, more than his children or our pending marriage. (ok, not literally.) He thinks it's perfect for our needs and that the work needed to make it our dream home is far less than that of the house I actually want.So please, just answer that pesky real estate agent that calls you every day. Just tell her "No. We actually want this property to foreclose so that we can destroy a family's credit, then sell it for less than what your people are offering." or say, "Sure, we will accept this offer. Assuming that, in another 45 days in the closing process, the buyers bank is still willing to offer them the killer financing deal they've spent the last 5 months trying to secure."

May your greedy asses fry in your Lear jets!

A Slightly Disgruntled Would-Be Home Buyer

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Dear Gigantic-ASS Hornet,

It was kind of you to greet me in the bathroom this morning. You are lucky that I was only wrapped in a towel and that Mr Man was still home, lest you would have been smashed into, and likely along with, my medicine cabinet's mirror. Your dance around the light bulbs was awe inspiring. It's almost like you knew I was waiting to hit you with my hairbrush just as soon as you got far enough away from anything breakable.I'm not entirely sure how you got in there, while I slept, but I hope you find your way out before I get home.There is a large can of Raid waiting for you.

Loathing You,The Girl Who's Shower You Ruined

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Dear Monkey,

Please quit kissing Henry!You are only 6. You can not have a boyfriend for at least 20 more years! Trust me, boys are really not worth your time until then anyway.

About Me

I'm Kissi.Girl. I didn't pick this name, it was bestowed upon me when I was a wee-child and I've kept it in my pocket all these years hoping to find an appropriate use for it, and here it is.
I work full-time at a part-time job, which allows me to share these thoughts with you. I'm married to an incredibly hard working cowboy. He pays the mortgage, I pay the bills, together we try not to kill the children.